Alivia Street

20 September, 2022

My name is Olivia. Olivia, with an O. And as an Olivia, I can boldly and rightly claim that “Alivia” is a dumb name.

My sincerest condolences to anyone named Alivia, but let’s think about this. People named “Olivia” get called “Alivia” anyway — the world is far too lazy to properly enunciate the O. Of the few people who do put in the (minimal) extra effort, I can tell you they don’t do it consistently. More often, even, the ‘Livias’ of the world get called just that: an abbreviated version of their already concise name.

Livia, Liv, Livvie, Via — Vi… at the end of the day, we all reduce down to the same. Just because you’re first initial is different, doesn’t make you better than the rest of us.

Curving around the corners of quickly dimming roads in Maine a month ago, these were my thoughts. The forest-green sheet metal lit up with the illumination from my headlights, creating a vortex of light around the most evident of signs. Why is it that Alivia gets her own street name while I get a headache?

It was completely unfair. Could no one else see what this was? I mean, there was no one else with me, but figuratively…

Alivia is a name trying to be something it’s not. Yet here she was, with a literal halo around her frame.

She was the social-climbing, back-stabbing girl who we were all friends in the seventh grade. She was the kid who plays first line every game, but wonders if the acting club is more genuine in their performance than they are excited about their sport. She was Aesop’s Miller, but for some inconceivable reason, it was paying off. Which was really freaking annoying.

The “O” is what makes Olivia, Olivia. It’s sort of our trademark — my trademark. At that moment, looking at that street sign, it felt as though the green piece of metal was trying to pry a vital part of me away from myself.

I realize now how stupid that may sound. No one should ever feel invalidated by an inanimate object, but sometimes that is where our mental processes lead us. It was a sense of powerlessness and a sense of exhaustion mixed together that brought me to that place, so please do not be so quick to judge.

I still stand by my assertions, but there is something to be said about letting go of the things that we cannot control.